“I am often asked by the media and others how did it come about that Donald Trump, the most unpopular presidential candidate in the modern history of our country, won the election,” Sanders said. “My answer is that Trump didn’t win the election the Democratic Party lost the election.”

Sanders’ statement was met with raucous applause from the crowd.

“Let us be very, very clear. The current model and the current strategy of the Democratic Party is an absolute failure,” Sanders continued. “This is not my opinion. This is the facts.”

Sanders then explain how Democrats have lost the House of Representatives, the Senate, how Republicans control almost two-thirds of the governorships in the United States, and how over the last nine years, Democrats have lost almost a thousand legislative seats in states across the country.

“Today, in almost half the states in America, the Democratic Party has almost no political presence at all,” Sanders continued. “Now if that’s not a failure, if that’s not a failed model, I don’t know what a failed model is.”

“The Democratic Party needs fundamental change, fundamental change,” Sanders concluded. “What it needs is to open it up its door to working people and young people and all people who are prepared to fight for social and economic justice.”